But that was only a small part of the enormous problem. Even if the entire fleet was able to make it across, the subterfuge and blitz methods they'd employed during the initial invasion of the Two Arm would no longer be possible. Once the shock of their reappearance wore off, the SG's Rapid Engagement Force — die real villains in this space opera — would be all over them. And no doubt, they would soon be joined by regular Solar Guards forces, and, not to forget, the ultraloyal Space Forces as well. In other words, the UPF would be facing the military might of the entire Fourth Empire. Just them, and twelve ships.
"If we make it back, the odds against us will be tremendous," Calandrx said now, his voice echoing in the dark little room. "But if we must go down, then we should go down fighting… and that means…"
He began stumbling for words. Everyone else tried hard to concentrate.
"And that means…" Calandrx began again. "That… the grass was especially brilliant earlier today. The wind was warm and soft and…"
He tried to bite his tongue to stop talking, but it was no use. He'd been sidetracked just like every time they tried to talk about anything that wasn't acceptable in this place of mandatory peace.
So Tomm tried to pick up where Calandrx left off.
"We will all have roles to play once we return to the other side," the monk started saying. "We know how we are going to attempt to go back. But there is no sense in talking about what happens after that now… because… as you know… the water down in the stream was especially tasty today, wasn't it? And…"
He stopped himself. It happened again. Heaven was intruding.
Klaaz gave it a try. "We will need more men, more weapons, more support," he began. "We will need to make sure that… that… we are all atop High Hill when the next twilight comes, because it will be extremely spectacular and…"
He, too, stopped talking. Three sentences were as far as he could get. The invisible euphoria gas was seeping into the closed compartment very quickly now.
Zarex jumped in. "Tomm is right; these are things we can only discuss once we get back," he said in rapid-fire fashion. "We can only plan it then… We must be prepared to… eat the golden apples near the big bend in the river, as they are especially sweet."
"That they are," Gordon said. "I had one earlier and…"
He stopped himself, and everyone smiled. They could go no further. Happiness and peace had found them again. This was all that could be said.
But they all had the basic idea: get one ship across, try as best as possible to smooth the way for the other eleven to follow.
And then prepare for a massive, one-sided, and most likely suicidal last battle.
But leaving Heaven would be more difficult than getting in.
There were several technical problems to overcome, beginning with the so-called Vanex Door itself.
It was an impressive structure, nearly a quarter of a mile wide and more than 750 feet high. Even more remarkable was that the elderly Imperial custodian had built it himself. Of course, he had the help of his electron torch, the do-it-all hand tool that could convert any kind of atom into any other kind of atom, and therefore allowed its owner to create just about anything out of practically nothing, so to speak.
Vanex and Xara had arrived in Heaven several days before the UPF fleet. To them though, their head start seemed the equivalent of several months, long enough for the engineer to conceive his genius invention and then actually construct it.
The structure was located near the south side of High Hill, about a quarter mile from the last bend in Happy Valley's river and a part of the UPF's little enclave where few of the local souls ever bothered to venture. It was a basic framework of thin, shiny girders, which essentially served as a 2,500-foot rectangular brace for the four Twenty 'n Six units. When connected, they created the crucial transdimensional field that made up the Vanex Door. The disassembled Echo 999.9, augmented by a ring of signal amplifiers, was positioned over the screen like a king's multijeweled crown. The Door was a magnificent achievement; gigantic and slightly asymmetrical, it was almost a work of art. It also looked as out of place as the twelve huge warships it helped bring here.
But it was its location that posed a significant problem. As each of the escaping UPF ships came through the Door, their power plants ground to a halt almost the instant they gained the airspace over Paradise. There were nearly a couple cataclysmic collisions in the first few hair-raising seconds as the ships had appeared so fast, their pilots barely had enough time to move their stalled vessels out of the way before the ship behind them popped through. This was why the UPF fleet was hovering above the heavenly landscape in such a haphazard fashion and not in any kind of a rigid formation.
The problem was rooted in the odd fact that once here, the twelve ships lost all power, except what was needed to keep them in their hover and to keep a few lamps illuminated. Many took this as further proof that someone or something was pulling the strings here, and while that entity didn't mind the ships invading its space, it was adamant about them not going anywhere once they arrived. Further proof of this: no electron torches worked after the ships crossed over here, though they had worked for Vanex before. Quadtxols didn't work here, either. Subtle things. But the message seemed clear: strong forces will become obstacles if you try to leave or even move around.
The problem then was that the ships were out of position to make the return trip back through the Door. The UPF engineers figured out mat the tiny modicum of power that was keeping the ships in the air could be used to push them forward back out the portal, but not much farther than that. There would not be nearly enough juice to maneuver the ships around so they would be pointing back at the Door.
The only solution: the portal would have to be moved to accommodate them.
The 40,000 members of the UPF fleet would provide the muscle for this project. They would have to deconstruct the Door's framework by hand and reassemble it, at a location near one of the stolen cargo 'crasher ships, Resonance 133.
As it would be this vessel to attempt the first reverse cross-over, the Vanex Door would have to be rebuilt just a few feet off its nose.
There was yet another problem, bigger than the repositioning of the Vanex Door. This one had to do with Hunter himself. When the Resonance 133 crew finally launched, there was no way he could go with them. Why? Because he'd not come here the same way they had.
They'd all come through the portal created by combining the Echo 999.9 and the Twenty 'n Six field.
Hunter, on the other hand, had come here via an Echo capsule, as had Xara and Vanex. The more direct approach, certainly, but it raised a huge question: What would happen to him if he rode back to the other side in the UPF ship? If he had entered Heaven by one means and then left in a completely different way, would there be any cosmic repercussions?
They didn't know. The Echo 999.9 was such a mysterious device, it was a miracle — literally — that Vanex had been able to manipulate it as much as he had. There was even speculation among the UPF contingent that the device wasn't a holo-girl capsule at all, not a typical one, anyway. That it was something else, just dressed up in a clever disguise.